NEWS about Botanical Art and for Botanical Artists

"The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney" exhibition at Kew Gardens

9/7/2018

The exhibition The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney opened at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery at Kew Gardens on 31 March and continues until 16th September 2018.

This is the second exhibition of this very impressive collection of watercolour paintings by members of The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney.
Click here for the list of Florilegium paintings and artists

It's a companion exhibition to Down Under II: Works from the Shirley Sherwood Collection which is a smaller exhibition of drawings and paintings of native Australian and New Zealand plants created by local and international artists - also on until 16th September - and also recommended by me.

Both are related to the reopening of The Temperate House in Kew Gardens - and a number of the paintings have an icon to indicate that the plants can be found in the Temperate House.

All the images in this post are of The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney exhibition - and contributing artists.

This week, there's an opportunity on Saturday 14 July, 10.30am-12.30pm to meet/greet Angela Lober, whose work is in the Shirley Sherwood Collection and on display as part of The Florilegium: Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. (Angela is also exhibiting at the RHS Botanical Art Show this week)

Her very impressive Video: Painting a Norfolk Island Pine for the RBG Sydney Florilegium (made for the original exhibition) is also playing in the Gallery as part of the exhibition.

Angela Lober (Araucaria heterophylla) and the video

This post covers:

the exhibition
videos related to the exhibition
the artists
related news posts

The Exhibition

This is a first class exhibition and one very definitely one not to be missed.
It sets a very high international standard for a large exhibition of a Florilegium.

Below are some views of the exhibition and how it was hung - for those Florilegium artists unable to travel to London for the exhibition - and for those of you who have not visited!

I hope they indicate the quality of the exhibition and why it should be viewed as essential viewing for those who are able.

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Botanical Art Exhibitions opening 30-31 March 2018

30/3/2018

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It's a VERY big weekend for celebrating botanical art exhibited in botanical gardens!
One botanical art exhibition opens today Friday 30th March and three open tomorrow, Saturday 31 March. These are listed below by location and venue.

The first two exhibitions are associated with the Botanical Art Worldwide initiative and are at

the Auckland Botanic Gardens in New Zealand and
the Royal Botanical Garden in Edinburgh, Scotland respectively.

Plus there are two exhibitions opening at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery in the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew - one of which has come all the way to Kew from the Royal Botanic Gardens in Sydney, Australia! (Plus a further exhibition about the refurbished Temperate House which is relevant to both the botanical art exhibitions)

New Zealand:
‘Ngāi Tipu Taketake – Indigenous Flora’

Exhibition ‘Ngāi Tipu Taketake – Indigenous Flora’

Venue: Auckland Botanic Gardens - Visitors Centre Gallery 102 Hill Rd, Manurewa, Auckland 2105
Dates: March 30th - 1st July 2018

followed by a tour to:

Wellington Botanic Gardens from 1 August - 9 September 2018
Millennium Gallery, Blenheim from 3 November - 9 December 2018

Selected artworks: see my blog post Selected New Zealand artists for ‘Ngāi Tipu Taketake - Indigenous Flora’ (Botanical Art Worldwide #3)

Scotland - Flora Scotia

Dear friends, artists and supporters, please come and join us for a glass of wine on Saturday 31st March at the opening of the Flora Scotia exhibition, John Hope Gateway, Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, 3.30 - 5.30 pm. We look forward to seeing you there!

Exhibition: Flora Scotia

Venue: John Hope Gateway at the Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh
Dates: 31st March - 3rd June 2018

Selected artworks: See my blog post Selected Scottish artists for 'Flora Scotia' (Botanical Art Worldwide #5)

DO READ: There are a number of splendid stories about how the plants were chosen and painted by the different artists on the Scottish Botanical Art Collective website.

Kew Gardens - Australian Flora: three new exhibitions

All three exhibitions relate to Australian flora and can be seen in the Shirley Sherwood Gallery at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew

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Alcatraz Florilegium Returns to The Rock!

29/9/2017

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A new exhibition of botanical drawings and paintings documenting the plants of the Gardens of Alcatraz has been announced - and opened last week!

Details are below and you can see more pictures of the exhibit on the Facebook Page of the Northern California Society of Botanical Artists who organise the development of the Florilegium

The exhibition includes 127 works of art depicting a variety of “survivor” plants growing on the island. They were created by 77 NCalSBA artists and selected for the exhibition by a jury.

Alcatraz Florilegium
Venue: Prison Band Rehearsal Room, Alcatraz Island
Dates: September 16th 2017 - January 17th 2018
Organised by: a project of Northern California Society of Botanical Artists (NCalSBA) in collaboration with the Garden Conservancy

Below is the Alcatraz Island Florilegium Committee - Catherine Watters, Sally Petru, and Lyn Dahl

The Gardens of Alcatraz were restored by three organisations working together with much support from dedicated volunteers. In 2003, the Garden Conservancy, Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy and National Park Service began their collaboration to restore the historic gardens. As every gardener knows the work to plant and prune, compost and weed, restore and maintain the gardens never ends!

REFERENCE:

The Gardens of Alactraz - website
The Gardens of Alcatraz - a pdf file about the restoration of the
The Gardens of Alcatraz Florilegium

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Call for Applications - Finnis Scott Foundation Botanical Art Award

7/5/2017

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The Finnis Scott Foundation has announced a Call for Applications for its NEW Botanical Art Award worth £10,000 for organisations involved with botanical art.

A number of leading people in the botanical art world have been helping to get the award set up. Applications will judged by a sub-committee of experts with knowledge of botanical art.

Below is a briefing about this brand new award. [Please note minor modifications have been made since this was first posted as matters have been clarified]

This is a very long post so there's a READ MORE break inserted - so make sure you click READ MORE to read the complete post.

The Finnis Scott Foundation Botanical Art Award (£10,000)

I've been asked by Charlotte Brooks, the Botanical Art Award Secretary, to help promote this award - which I'm very happy to do.

Below I've tried to do my usual review of the terms and conditions for a "call for entries" and have created a digest, highlighting key facts and making some suggestions.

Any queries need to be addressed by emailing the Secretary: botanicalartaward@finnis-scott-foundation.org.uk

What is the Botanical Art Award?

The Finnis Scott Foundation is offering a NEW biennial award (every two years) valued at up to £10,000, to support and promote the practice of botanical painting.

The aim of the Award is that it should enable established botanical art groups to:

either extend their current practice
and/or create something new and exciting to do with botanical art.

It's important to note that it's expected that the funding from the Award will last for no longer than two years - hence if any project is to have a longer life it will need to secure recurrent funding from other sources before or during the project.

Suitable Projects

The award will fund

discrete projects that promote and encourage the practice and appreciation of botanical painting.

It enables dedicated botanical art societies and similar groups to apply for funding to develop projects they wouldn’t otherwise be able to carry out.

It encourages botanical artists, who often work alone, to collaborate and co-operate with other botanical artists with a view to promoting the practice of botanical art and and creating and outcome for those who appreciate it.

It recognises the contribution of those who have already helped raise the profile of botanical art and now want to further extend their reach to new audiences by enabling them to carrying out something 'extra-ordinary' (i.e. not just business as usual)

Obviously the nature of the project is up to individual groups to decide.

Projects might involve develop educational and creative opportunities e.g. developing

development of a new exhibition,
creation of study workshops or
a publication that will help raise the profile of botanical art.

The judges are looking to reward fresh ideas, original projects and new ways of working.

My thoughts, for what they are worth - in terms of what I think are "gaps" in botanical art activities in the UK - is that a project might be

an event focused on botanical art for the benefit of botanical artists (e.g. an educational conference/symposium)
development of a new sustainability focused Flora - in liaison with relevant botanists/botany groups
a non-garden based Florilegium e.g. one based on native plants found in specific habitats in the UK - with the aim that this should develop over time and attract future sponsorship through the use of the Award for initial output and as seed funding.

Next - the application process (who/what/how/when)!

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Tradescants’ Orchard: A Celebration of Botanical Art

12/4/2017

Celebrating a renovated Garden Museum

Tradescants’ Orchard: A Celebration of Botanical Art will be the first exhibition in the brand new exhibition space in the renovated Garden Museum (which has been closed for a major redevelopment in the past year).

Pineapple by Lesley Anne Sandford

The garden at the Museum re-opens on 22nd May. However the opening date for the exhibition is still not confirmed - but will be on display at between late May and September (opening date to be finalised)

The Tradescants' Orchard is a contemporary exhibition comprising watercolours by fifty eminent botanical artists is to be staged alongside a display of ‘The Tradescants’ Orchard’, a seventeenth-century volume of sixty-six watercolours depicting fruit varieties that John Tradescant and his son might have grown in their market garden at Lambeth.

Hence, the exhibition has two parts:

an exhibition of 17th century watercolours called "the Tradescants' Orchard" from the Ashmolean Museum. This is an official Treasure of the Bodleian Library at Oxford University.
an exhibition of botanical paintings of orchard fruit by contemporary botanical artists (listed below).

The Tradescants' Orchard

The Tradescants' Orchard is a practical document that records the size, colour and texture of fruit with their ripening dates.

This is the first time the watercolours from The Tradescants' Orchard have been lent by the Bodleian Libraries to an exhibition outside Oxford.

They come from the collection of Elias Ashmole, whose collection founded the Ashmolean museum.

A painting from the collection associated with the Tradescant Orchard

Contemporary paintings of fruit

The Garden Museum invited artists from across the globe to participate in the project and the exhibition will include botanical artwork from Europe, Korea and USA.

Many have selected varieties now considered to be heritage fruits. Some are painted on vellum which is a surface with a great heritage.

Exhibiting artists

The participating artists are mostly linked to the existing Florilegium Societies - which focus on painting plants in gardens - or are ex-students at the Chelsea Physic Garden (just across the river). They also include artists from the USA and the Netherlands.

In the list of participating botanical artists below (click "read more" bottom right), those with an asterisk * after their name can also be found in my section about Contemporary Botanical Artists and Illustrators on this website.

Each has a mini bio - where information was available. A link to their websites or more information about them is embedded in their names (if available)

Pomegranates on Branch, Punica Granatum by Heidi Venamore

Book Review: "The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney: Celebrating 200 Years"

13/12/2016

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The botanical paintings included in The Florilegium: The Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney: Celebrating 200 Years are by members of The Florilegium Society at the Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney Inc. which was formed in 2005

This is very special publication.

It's the first time this Florilegium Society has published paintings in book form and has been a long time in the making..
It is one of the most impressive botanical art books published in 2016.
It also helped celebrate the 200th anniversary of the founding of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Sydney.
Plus it is the catalogue of the paintings included in the Florilegium: Sydney's Painted Garden Exhibition which was held at the Museum of Sydney between 30 July and 30 October 2016. (The exhibition will also come to Kew in 2018).

The standard of the plant portraits is so high and the text so illuminating that this will make a memorable book and exhibition. I do hope that it will also be exhibited in the Shirley Sherwood Gallery at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew in 2018
Dr. Shirley Sherwood Patron of the Florilegium Society

Cover of "The Florilegium. Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. Celebrating 200 Years: Plants of the Three Gardens of the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust" published April 2016 © 2015 Foundation & Friends of the Botanic Gardens

You can find a list of all the artists and links to their websites in my earlier blog post "The Florilegium and the Royal Botanic Garden, Sydney". You can also find out more about the plants recorded and the contributing artists in this List of Florilegium paintings and artists

The Society very kindly sent me a copy of the book to review. I was really pleased as I had it on my list of books to order - and this is that review which is a little bit later than I had planned!

It contains

87 paintings - displayed on full colour plates - by 41 Australian and 23 overseas artists.
botanical descriptions written by Louisa Murray, the Flora of NSW botanist and Collections Manager at the National Herbarium of NSW.
a preface by Dr Brett Summerell, the Director of Science and Conservation at the RBGDT
a preface by Dr Shirley Sherwood - the Patron of the Florilegium Society at the Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney
an excellent introduction by Beverley Allen, the President of the Florilegium Society.
an historical overview of the Gardens by Colleen Morris, a heritage consultant and former National Chair of the Australian Garden History Society and the curator of Florilegium: Sydney’s Painted Garden. She also provided information about the introduction of the plant to the garden.
information about the florilegium society and
biographies of the 64 artists and the two authors compiled by Angela Lober

The Florilegium Project

Florilegium Society President Beverley Allen provides an informative overview of the development of contemporary florilegium projects from the heritage of florilegia of the past. She discussses how this project was conceived as giving the Society ten years to produce a body of work to produce a record of the historical plants in time for the 200th anniversary celebrations in 2016, In other words this book has been in the planning pipeline for some considerable time!

She also describes well the demands upon the artist in completing a plant portrait.

The plants are painted life-size, unless noted otherwise on the painting, and most are reproduced at about half painted size. Some show the plant in its entirety, some the flower and fruiting bodies, in others, the focus is that most recognisable and showiest of all structures, the flower, further playing out its biological role in attracting attention.
Beverley Allen - President of the Florilegium Society

The Paintings

The first thing to emphasise is that the quality of the paintings is extremely high. This book really sets a standard for Florilegium Societies which will be difficult to match.

For all those florilegium societies contemplating a book in future, I very much recommend you get a copy of this book. It's an education in what's involved in developing a project and book like this.
For all those botanical artists hoping to contribute to prestigious florilegium collections in the future, this book provides an excellent introduction to the standards expected.

The botanical art displayed in this book is definitely at the high end of the spectrum; these are works of incredible accuracy and of undeniable beauty that fully respect the plants they portray,
Dr Brett Summerell (Preface) - Director of the RBGS

I like the fact that although many of the paintings fulfil what is required of them in terms of scientific accuracy and information about the plant, they also have a contemporary feel about them. It's good to see people not being constrained by conventional and traditional ideas of what botanical art "should look like". After all, the contemporary styles of today's top botanical artists might well be viewed as a more traditional perspective on botanical art in 100 years time as methods, styles and approaches continue to adapt and refine!

I also particularly like that this Society has sought contributions from excellent artists to achieve the standard of paintings included in the Florilegium. This means that a number of artists come from outside Australia and New Zealand. I'm guessing one of the incentives was to make sure enough artworks were completed before 2016 to ensure that there were enough excellent paintings to include in an exhibition and a book.

Dianne Sutherland-Ball (UK) painted the Jade Vine and flew to Sydney to visit the exhibition.

The Plants

In terms of the plants included, they are a mix of Australian Natives and plants imported to Australia and grown in the Botanic Garden.

Each plant has a double page spread of a full colour plate with a facing page of authoritative but accessible text providing both a description of the plant and a narrative about its history within the RBG Sydney.

When I first went to Australia (where my sister lives with her family) I was particularly struck by the different plants found "down under". This was reinforced when I paid my own visit to the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney. Recently I was reminded of this again when writing about Marianne North who was told by Charles Darwin that she needed to visit Australia to see and paint the native plants of Australia which she would not have seen elsewhere on her travels across many countries!

I was reminded again of the unique nature of some Australian plants and those that feature prominently as native plants while browsing this book. It's more than a portrait of the plants found in the Botanical Gardens in Sydney - it's also a portrait of Australia's native plant life.

At the same time it's a reflection of the scope and development of the collection at the RBGS over 200 years in terms of plants collected in other countries and introduced to the plant collections in the three gardens of RBGS during the 20th century.

The Book

In terms of the publication itself, it's printed on paper which lends itself to better quality colour reproduction of the images of the plants. However it's also slightly heavier paper which contributes to my only slight quibble about the book.

This is a HEAVY book. It's available both as a hardback and a paperback - and the version I have is a paperback. My preference when buying big heavy books is to buy a hardback - simply because I find they make me confident when handling them. The paperback version makes me feel I need to be careful in the way I handled it when reviewing the plates and the text. However I have a tilt stand for larger books and it was fine on that.

All in all, this is very definitely a book for any serious student of Florilegia and/or botanical art and/or a fan of the Royal Botanic Garden in Sydney.

How to get a copy of "The Florilegium"

The book is being sold by: The Garden Shop at the RBGS, Florilegium and Summerfield Books to online purchasers.

These are the technical book details.

Title: The Florilegium. Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. Celebrating 200 Years: Plants of the Three Gardens of the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust
Authors: Colleen Morris, Louisa J. Murray
Publisher: Florilegium Society at the Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney Incorporated, 2016
ISBN: 0994477910, 9780994477910
Length: 224 pages

REFERENCE

The book was published with the generous support of

the Australian Garden History Society - Kindred Spirits Fund.
the subscribers of the Florilegium Society who generously contributed the costs of publishing.

There's an article about the book in

The RBGS Foundation & Friends "Gardens" Magazine (Spring 2015)
the Australian Garden History Journal Vol. 28 No. 1 July 2016

You can see a brief biography and find a link to the website of some of the artists who contributed to this book on my page about Botanical Artists in Australia and New Zealand

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The making of the Highgrove Florilegium

4/9/2016

This is about the making, publishing and exhibiting of the very first British Royal Florilegium - The Highgrove Florilegium.

This post highlights some videos I've not seen before of the process of producing and then exhibiting the florilegium around the world. At the end if more information about the making of the garden at Highgrove - and how you can visit.

Still from the YouTube Video "The Highgrove Florilegium: A Visit with Iain Bain"

The Highgrove Florilegium

This is the first published British Florilegium about a garden. (Previously there has been the Flora Londinensis - which was a collection of plates and descriptions of plants that grow wild in the Environs of London).

It was created to celebrate the 60th birthday of the Prince of Wales (who became the new Patron of the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in July).

Painting and horticulture are two major interests of the Prince of Wales - and these were very successfully combined in the project to develop The Highgrove Florilegium.

The publication is limited to just 175 numbered sets of two volumes of 120 watercolours dedicated by the Artists to His Royal Highness which record the plants in the gardens at Highgrove, the family home of the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall near Tetbury in Gloucestershire . The first volume was published by Alecto Publications in April 2008 andThe Prince received his second and final volume in July 2009.

Two videos (below) show you:

the making of the two volumes and the technical processes involved in creating a book which will last for hundreds of years
a little about the artists involved
more about how the book was exhibited around the world following publication. (I went to one of those exhibitions - at the Garden Museum in London).

Finally there is a list of the different places where some of the original watercolours and the two volumes have been exhibited - and a video about the gardens at Highgrove!

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